Useful observer orientation

[gzotti]

Description

After @10110111 discovered an important detail which improved orientation of the "observer" pseudo-planets (#3029), we can finally make them a bit more useful. Notable changes:

• when on an observer, freeze location on the North pole
• inhibit landscape drawing
• change location name display in the bottom bar
• don't draw a few coordinate grids (more? please comment)
• Modify Location dialog to inhibit a few settings while in observer mode
• update SUG

Fixes #1202 (issue)

Screenshots (if appropriate):

Type of change

• Bug fix (non-breaking change which fixes an issue)
• New feature (non-breaking change which adds functionality)
• Breaking change (fix or feature that would cause existing functionality to change)
• This change requires a documentation update

How Has This Been Tested?

Test Configuration:

• Operating system: Win11
• Graphics Card: Geforce M3070Ti

Checklist:

• My code follows the code style of this project.
• I have performed a self-review of my own code
• I have commented my code, particularly in hard-to-understand areas
• I have made corresponding changes to the documentation (header file)
• I have updated the respective chapter in the Stellarium User Guide
• My changes generate no new warnings
• I have added tests that prove my fix is effective or that my feature works
• New and existing unit tests pass locally with my changes
• Any dependent changes have been merged and published in downstream modules

[github-actions]

Great PR! Please pay attention to the following items before merging:

Files matching src/**/*.cpp:

• Are possibly unused includes removed?

Files matching guide/**:

• Did you remember to update screenshots to match new updates?
• Did you remember to grammar check in changed part of documentation?

This is an automatically generated QA checklist based on modified files.

[10110111]

don't draw a few coordinate grids (more? please comment)

What other grids do we have? Azimuthal grid should remain IMO. Equatorial is now equivalent to it (except for the units of azimuth), so can be disabled indeed. What the fixed equator line is I don't know (just a line on the ground?)

[gzotti]

don't draw a few coordinate grids (more? please comment)

What other grids do we have? Azimuthal grid should remain IMO. Equatorial is now equivalent to it (except for the units of azimuth), so can be disabled indeed. What the fixed equator line is I don't know (just a line on the ground?)

The fixed equatorial system is the system of hour angle/declination used in classical position astronomy, i.e. does not make sense in a location-less place. Likewise, the horizon/compass marks are useless. Others may be discussed. Just that I need to play a bit more now. It seems the displayed "azimuth" grid is now finally really aligned with the planet's axis.

[gzotti]

Now that we can really see Jupiter and Saturn systems more stabilized, I can see (again) that the moons' orbit lines still overdraw the planets when the respective moon is closer than the planet. (#82)

[gzotti]

OK, should be ready for a test. The wheeling through now fails, though.

[gzotti]

Huh, I never did that... You have always new ways of operation! :-)

[gzotti]

Grr, it's simple if Location panel has been created already before searching.
OK, that was not so hard. But going from Jupiter observer to Saturn shows the same issue as before: default landscape for Saturn does not load. I am afraid I have to add an optional parameter to StelCore::moveObserverTo(., ., ., landscapeID) which is then emitted in an enlarged signal StelCore::targetLoationChanged(StelLocation, QString)

[alex-w]

@gzotti please check another "new way of operation" :)

1. Run Stellarium
2. Enable showing nomenclature
3. Open Search tool and find any nomenclature item
4. Ctrl+G (Go to nomenclature item)
5. Open Location dialog

What happenes at step 4 and 5?

[gzotti]

@gzotti please check another "new way of operation" :)
[...]

What happenes at step 4 and 5?

It works for me. What did you see?

[alex-w]

It works for me. What did you see?

Good news! I didn't checked it - I just remembered about this behaviour and shared notice about, but in that time I didn't can check it.

[gzotti]

@10110111 do you still see anything that should be corrected?
I think this time I will only rebase, not squash, despite some experimental commits.

[10110111]

Functionally I didn't notice any more glitches. Code-wise though, cannot help but object to the committing of commented-out code. It's especially ugly when you doubly comment-out (see the body of LocationDialog::handleDialogSizeChanged), or introduce fresh-but-commented-out code (as in LocationDialog::setLocationUIvisible).

[gzotti]

Ah yes, thanks for reminding me.

[gzotti]

Shall I also clean out ssystem_major.ini? Then going back to the old behaviour is more difficult. But maybe it's even time to no longer go back! (remove the define in Orbit.h) @alex-w , @10110111 ?

[alex-w]

Clean up the ssystem_major.ini file is OK for me

[github-actions]

Hello @gzotti!

The enhancement or feature has been merged into source code and you may test it via building Stellarium from source code or wait the weekly development snapshot...

[github-actions]

Hello @gzotti!

The fix has been merged into source code and you may test it via building Stellarium from source code or wait the weekly development snapshot...

[github-actions]

Hello @gzotti!

Please check the fresh version (development snapshot) of Stellarium:
https://github.com/Stellarium/stellarium-data/releases/tag/weekly-snapshot

[github-actions]

Hello @gzotti!

Please check the latest stable version of Stellarium:
https://github.com/Stellarium/stellarium/releases/latest